David Brankin Elementary 25-26

Every day, students at David Brankin Elementary are given opportunities to develop as writers and communicators. Over the past several years, our literacy work has focused primarily on reading development. As our students continued to build stronger reading skills, we recognized an opportunity to strengthen writing instruction across the school and create greater consistency in how writing is taught, practiced, and assessed.

This year, our focus has been on helping students become more confident, capable writers who can clearly communicate their ideas for a variety of purposes and audiences. We worked to strengthen foundational writing skills, create shared expectations across grade levels, and provide students with authentic opportunities to write, reflect, and share their work.

To guide our work, we focused on the following writing goals:

• Strengthening writing conventions, including spelling, grammar, punctuation, and sentence construction
• Building students' ability to generate, organize, and expand their ideas
• Creating consistent writing expectations across grade levels
• Supporting self-reflection and revision as part of the writing process
• Increasing opportunities for authentic writing and student voice
• Using common assessment practices to monitor growth
• Deepening staff understanding of effective writing instruction through collaborative professional learning

Throughout the year, teachers worked together to establish common writing goals and review student work. Grade teams were released and used collaborative planning time during monthly ROAR assemblies to discuss instructional strategies, examine writing samples, and align expectations across classrooms. Our Writing Committee helped develop school-wide approaches to instruction and introduced staff to concepts from various resources (one major source being The Writing Rope, which emphasizes the many interconnected skills required for successful writing).

In the primary grades, students focused on building strong foundations through oral storytelling, sentence formation, handwriting, spelling, and artistic captioning. Teachers provided scaffolded support to help students understand that writing is both a creative form of expression and a skill that follows established conventions. Intermediate students worked on developing paragraphs, expanding ideas, considering multiple perspectives, and writing for different audiences and purposes.

To make writing meaningful, students wrote across all subject areas and engaged in projects connected to their interests, experiences, and learning. Monthly ROAR assemblies highlighted different aspects of the writing process, including critical thinking, writing craft, text structure, and transcription skills. Students also shared poems, stories, and other written work during these assemblies and other celebrations, helping to build confidence and pride in their growth as writers.

Several school-wide initiatives supported our focus. Students maintained writing portfolios to track their progress over time, participated in cross-grade writing activities, and explored connections between art and writing through storytelling and visual expression. Opportunities, such as creative writing contests, Reader's Theatre, and student voice projects, encouraged students to write for authentic audiences and purposes.

To better understand student growth, teachers completed a school-wide writing assessment in the fall and again in the spring. Using common rubrics, student self-reflections, and collaborative reviewing of writing samples, staff gathered evidence of progress in conventions and clarity. 

This is an example from one of our grade 2 classes:

And here are a couple graphs of the assessed proficiency levels of our learners across all grades in October (our "pre-assessment") compared to those gathered in May (our "post assessment):

Our school-wide writing assessments indicate encouraging growth in students' writing proficiency over the course of the year. In October, 30% of students were proficient or extending in writing conventions and idea clarity. By May, that figure had increased to 42%. Correspondingly, the percentage of students performing at an emerging or developing level decreased from 70% to 58%. While many students continue to require support in improving their organization, elaboration of ideas, and use of writing conventions, the data suggests that our school-wide focus on writing is helping grow these skills. Anecdotally, teachers also noted improved writing stamina and a greater willingness among students to revise and refine their work.

We believe that writing is a powerful tool for learning, communication, and self-expression. By focusing on both the foundational skills and the creative aspects of writing, we believe we are helping students develop the confidence and competence they need to communicate effectively in school and beyond. The ways in which we plan to continue and expand upon this work will be explored further in the "Our Next Steps" section.

The evidence gathered through our writing inquiry this year - including collaboratively-developed writing assessments, classroom observations, portfolio samples, and student self-reflections - suggests that our increased focus on writing instruction benefitted student learning.

Additionally, students seemed to respond positively to opportunities to write for authentic purposes, and monthly ROAR assemblies, developing Reader's Theatre scripts for a school-wide event, writing contests, and classroom celebrations appeared to help raise the profile of writing throughout the school. 

While these results are encouraging, our data and teacher observations indicate that there is still important work ahead. Many students continue to require support with elaborating on their ideas, organizing their thinking, revising their work, and applying writing conventions independently. Teachers also noted that students often demonstrate writing skills during guided practice but have difficulty transferring those skills consistently to independent writing tasks.

Moving Forward

Building on the foundation established this year, during the 2026-27 school year we plan to continue our school-wide focus on writing while refining our instructional practices in order to strengthen student outcomes.

To support this work, we will:

• Continue developing a school-wide writing progression that clearly outlines writing expectations and skills from Kindergarten to Grade 7.
• Deepen our use of The Writing Rope and other resources to support instruction in areas such as sentence construction, text structure, idea development, vocabulary, conventions, and revision.
• Expand opportunities for students to write for authentic audiences and purposes through celebrations, performances, leadership opportunities, and community-connected projects.
• Refine our common assessment practices, including the use of writing portfolios, shared rubrics, and school-wide writing samples to monitor growth over time.
• Continue providing professional learning opportunities for staff focused on effective writing instruction, feedback, and assessment.
• Create additional opportunities for cross-grade collaboration, allowing students to share writing, mentor younger learners, and see themselves as members of a broader community of writers.
• Maintain our focus on supporting multilingual learners through targeted vocabulary development, oral language opportunities, and instructional scaffolds that help students communicate their thinking clearly in writing.

As we move forward, our goal remains to nurture confident, resilient, and capable writers who can communicate with clarity, creativity, and purpose. By continuing to build a consistent and intentional approach to writing instruction across the school, we believe our students will develop the skills and confidence needed to express themselves effectively in school and throughout their lives.